He is defensive...
I will be doing that monday...however for the specialty feature you know that Im interested in they have no libraries yet...most of those are just 'parts' earlier said to be importable, now not so importable. it appears you can import someone other programs single solid, but apparently not an 'assembly'' for insance no the same vendors frame or pipe routed drawings...those have to stay in plain vanilla. On inquiry thats not going to change anytime soon.
also... when it comes to editing a single peice...no problem...put that piece in a large assembly with
50 different connections... the connections preclude that same change.still I can make that work to my benefit but its beyond the scope of their canned tutorials...
I will be pressing that point next weel...it should go OK...but I am returning their pipe and wire routing programs, not even remotely close to what IV had.. I dont think I wll be changing my mind either...but who knows.
the company introduced their guys recently...on a vid.. two guys..smart looking and I like parts of their work.
I was however driving past AutoDesk in San Rafael calf last week, lo and behold, half a mile from what I thought was their main huge building complex was a nest of several other huge buildings, and a mile from there are 4 more huge buildings, 4 stores tall, 400 to 600' long... and more huge buildings down the road.... and thats just in San Rafael.
maybe it takes more than two guys to sort some of this stuff out...maybe even 4 or 5 guys do you think?
that entire dialog box and list of tube available looked like a total newbie got ahold of a chinese proctology specialty tube catalog that he didnt understand, and cloned its optons as what you would need to run tube in an industrial enviornment....
left me breathless ... and that passed their QC and management? and is presented as a state of the art pipe routing program? ... so now I have red flags by the bushel.
None the less if the feature you know I want can be made to work (as I had planned on from the start), Id be weilling to junk the rest just for that capabilty.
It is just that they will have to provide some correct and functional tutorials, and skip the goal of teaching 38 things in one video. with crucial data missing, .along with the sales pitch, sure as hell not missing...and instructions to 'press the OK button' when there is none.... or a help menu thats supposed to be context sensitive but gives you help menu's and instructtions that do not fits the screens and mode you are in...
there are 8 different major modeling and assembly modes you can be in... and dozens of sub modes, all dragging up the *same help insructions.. none telling you whch mode you have be in for the instruction to be relevant... no screen shots for you to indentify your correct mode or not... etc....
it took a day to sort out which one was appropriate for what mode I was in....sorted out by trying them all, and noticing which menu options fit one of the options and how to do it instructs. with bugs, such as go to 'groups'/ environs.
well fine, there is no 'groups' tab... what they meant was find the environs tab... they were calling all the stuff inside the environs tab a group.. but you will never find group mentioned in any menu. so you will not find a 'group' tab. that sort of thing.
it will be a job to sort out I know, but if not sorted out, will preclude any sort of growth into the modeling market....imo.
those folk have a lot of work to do....I will suffer with them for a bit, but not if I get arrogance and demands for first rate maintenance fees as I suffer with their own errors... if they want to stay in business that aspect of their act will need a serious revamp.
My calls to that quarter of the company convinced me that no such change is even remotely in the offing.... I thanked the man for his time graciously, even though he had been arrogant and rude...I said he had helped me make up my mind and thanked him again... he stuttered a bit as I hung up.
I dont want to mention any names until the scene comes clear, and what can or cannot be done is sorted out...at this point for the record it could be any one of 5 solids modeling options ive been working with. Next will be a cheapie... but well established turboCAD... it has a large world wide following... must be a reason for that... I might well be able to suffer its limitations...which I notice are fast dissapearing with each iteration.
Phil scott
the jury is definitely still out...I am a green as grass newbie idiot when it comes to solid modeling...but also wasnt born last week... I can see if a tutorial is simply bogus after a while, or zoom in on part that is supposed to be a fitting and see that it was only a fast sketch mock up at best...etc... and I can see if the tutorial says 'now click the OK' button..
and there is no OK button... just a 'proceed with next interation' button or some such idiocy.
that tells me, no proof reading, no testing to insure it works, no caring if it works, a willingness to lie and say it works when sure as hell it cant work as they are telling you. Combined that is not my style and does not work to make me viable in my business.
The tactic has been the easy way out...'oh just do these tutorials and you will be able to sort out the rest for yourself'.... not so. thats like me telling a 2 year old 'here read these 35 encyclopedia's and you will be able to sort the rest out yourself'....not hardly.
or teaching fully 20 different things in one tutorial, 5 different ways, and all sorts of caveats...and then expecting retention.
Retention is accomplished 100% by teaching one thing at a time, burning that in, then teaching one other thing....
also delivering a sales pitch and bragging on the capabilitiies etc. in the middle of an instructional tutorial clouds the issue and makes learning more difficult.
that said, I am coming along despite the issues, of which I was told there were none... you know how that is... then now In told.. "oh we are fixing that in the next release'...
integrity works better. Bugs I understand and can cope with...but trying to hide them just makes matters worse. Making the demo' vids look easy, is also understandable but its dupliciious...it works for a corporation maybe...but for me I need the the straight dope, fast and clean...bugs and all... then I can steer around them.
I am still trying to fathom what happens in this culture...I think the rush to get a product to market in its buggy form takes precident over getting it out perfect, when perfect will never happen ..... in the meantime the competition gets a product out and some people hooked on it.
so we get marketing spin... that can and has been fatal for many people.
also what works for a corporate engineering dept, with deep pockets and maybe just a few products.. they can hire guys to spend a year full time learning how to do a few simple things.
us entrepreur types need to rock and roll fast... the teaching styles are different, and so is the sales approach....be cannot be as tolerant of non workabiity or a slow learning curve.
Phil scott
4 or 5 guys and 30 + yearsBob